Opinion

Riverside County government has a significant task before it. The county intends to dip into its reserves, dropping below county policy of maintaining reserves worth 25 percent of discretionary revenues, and proceed to keep spending flat for several years to come. This is the county’s plan to achieve and maintain a structurally balanced budget.

Whether the county can actually do this remains to be seen, given that it requires a level of restraint not seen in recent years, as well as cooperation from county labor unions holding off any significant pay or benefit increases for years.

In order to have any chance of actually getting the county to a structural balance, it is critical the that Board of Supervisors dramatically scales up its involvement in discussing, reviewing and overseeing county operations and budgets.

To their credit, the board has shown signs of this in recent budget meetings.

On June 20 and 21, the board convened budget hearings and things generally went well.

The board approved the recommended budget and decided to have a follow-up meeting on June 28 to discuss additional topics related to the budget and to recommend changes, which county staff would then incorporate into a final budget to be voted on July 26.

At that June 28 meeting, things seemed to go well. Relatively minor changes were proposed, and Supervisor John Benoit proposed changing how county budgeting processes work to create a more deliberative process. Seemingly all of the supervisors were on board, and some elaborated the need for more work on the county budgets going forward.

“I’m paid to be here doing this job full time and if I have to dedicate weeks in and weeks out to understand all this and hear from the departments during board meetings or committee meetings or whatever, that’s what I’m paid to do,” said Supervisor Kevin Jeffries. Supervisor Marion Ashley reiterated his calls for more metric-based budgeting.

Then something strange happened. Supervisor John Tavaglione became annoyed that the board wasn’t going to approve a final budget that day. “I’ve never seen a circus like this in my entire life,” he said.

“John, I’m curious, tell me what we would do instead of what we’re doing, so that I can understand your frustration,” asked Supervisor Chuck Washington. “I think everyone is trying to give this thoughtful consideration and work within the parameters of what we have.”

“I just think you guys need to figure it out for yourselves,” replied Mr. Tavaglione, cutting off Mr. Washington. “No further comment.”

Seemingly bewildered, other supervisors reiterated the need for additional conversations about the budget. “This is a basic budget and a process to debate it and decide,” said Jeffries. “Sorry it offends you, that is what we’re here to do.”

With Mr. Tavaglione dissenting, the board approved a number of proposals and instructed county staff to come back at the end of July with a budget reflecting those proposals.

It is clear that much more work and thought needs to be done among the Board to get involved in the budget process.

County taxpayers need to keep the pressure on for the board to engage even more and work for making every dollar count.

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